J. Edgar Hoover, the man who ran the FBI for almost 50 years, was in some ways the closest the United States has ever been to having an unelected dictator. He started his long career abusing the law for the purpose of security, and he ended his career abusing the law for the purpose of gaining leverage and improving his legacy.

Clint Eastwood’s ambitious and mostly objective biopic “J. Edgar,” attempts to understand Hoover by shining some light on his personal life. Eastwood and the Oscar-winning “Milk” screenwriter Dustin Lance Black acknowledge the heavily circulated rumors about his sexuality by displaying Hoover as a man in love with his best friend but never quite able to act on it.

Aided by prosthetics and special make up, Leonardo DiCaprio plays Hoover from his young days as a work-obsessed man in the Department of Justice until he died at his home at the age of 77. In a performance sure to be nominated for an Oscar, DiCaprio plays Hoover as a man with who put on a façade of confidence his whole life, but had difficulties coming to terms with his love for his number two man, Clyde Tolson (Armie Hammer).

Juxtaposed with his own secret life, we frequently see Hoover collecting secret tapes and files of high profile people like Eleanor Roosevelt or John F. Kennedy engaging in “immoral” or “un-American” acts. He then used those collected secrets to gain leverage on the Presidents he was supposed to serve under, but really was just as powerful as, if not more powerful.

Amidst all of this Eastwood never judges Hoover. There are multiple elements besides his sexuality that affected Hoover, including his obsession with his legacy and his relationship with his very influential mother (Judi Dench). It can be tempting to create a clear arc through a person’s life when consolidating these events into a story, but Eastwood brings them all up and tells the audiences that this was how his life was. Some may see the movie as unfocused and confusing, but life is unfocused and confusing.

“J. Edgar” tries to capture Hoover’s life in a “Citizen Kane”-like fashion in which Hoover’s sexuality is his “rosebud,” and while the movie definitely does not reach the heights of “Citizen Kane,” it is respectable and relatively successful attempt at capturing the whole of one man’s eventful life.

But the flaws of the film stand out much more because it aspires to be so much. The structure of the movie cuts between the old Hoover dictating his memoirs and important events featuring his younger self. The thematic significance as to why we are cutting from one period to another is not always clear.

There are also many things that could have been explored further. Most significantly there is the case of Helen Gandy (Naomi Watts), Hoover’s life-long secretary. Her character is mostly inconsequential and never explored even though she was one of the very few people he was close to and trusted with some of his secrets.

The world of “J. Edgar” is dimly lit, suggesting a world filled with secrets hiding in the shadows. Hoover was a man who was very successful in finding those secrets, but also very successful in hiding his own. The movie tries to bring those secrets to light, and in doing so hopes to reveal a bit more of who this man really was. Hoover may not have appreciated how this movie reveals some of his darkest and deepest secrets, but he of all people would have understood why unearthing secrets can be so tempting.

Grade: B